When I think of this term “highly sensitive person” my mind immediately thinks of a cry baby, someone who is overly dramatic or has a histrionic personality.
This is a term some of us have never heard of, and if you have, it has been a more recently used term. No, it is not a new mental health diagnosis, but it is a new way of looking at personality type. In the book written by Elaine Aron, she discusses this conception of the highly sensitive person? She describes the HSP as having a keen imagination,vivid dreams and become are often told they are “too shy” or “too sensitive” according to others. They have the need to be alone during the day and noise and confusion become very overwhelming. Aron explains in her book how to understand yourself and your trait to create a fuller, richer life.
Do some of these things sound like you?
- Do you get rattled when you have a lot to do in a short amount of time?
- Do you make it a high priority to arrange your life to avoid upsetting or overwhelming situations?
- Do you need to withdraw during busy days, into bed or a darkened room or some other place where you can have privacy and relief from the situation?
- Are you easily overwhelmed by such things as bright lights, strong smells, coarse fabrics, or sirens nearby?
- When you were a child, did your parents
or teachers see you as sensitive or shy?
- Do you make a point of avoiding violent movies and TV shows?
- Do you notice or enjoy delicate or fine scents, tastes, sounds, or works of art?
- Do you have a rich and complex inner life? (Aron, 2016)
If you answered yes to some of these questions and are curious to see if you are an HSP, then you can take a self test at http://hsperson.com/test/
The Huffington Post wrote a great article 16 Habits of Highly Sensitive People using a guide written by Ted Zeff. In his article, he explains the strengths and challenges of the HSP.
1. They feel more deeply.
One of the hallmark characteristics of highly sensitive people is the ability to feel more deeply than their less-sensitive peers. “They like to process things on a deep level,” Ted Zeff, Ph.D., author of The Highly Sensitive Person’s Survival Guide and other books on highly sensitive people, tells HuffPost. “They’re very intuitive, and go very deep inside to try to figure things out.”
2. They’re more emotionally reactive.
People who are highly sensitive will react more or feel more in a situation. For instance, they will have more empathy and feel more concern for a friend’s problems. They may also have more concern about how another person may be reacting in the face of a negative event.
3. They’re probably used to hearing, “Don’t take things so personally” and “Why are you so sensitive?”
Depending on the culture, sensitivity can be perceived as an asset or a negative trait, Zeff explains. In some of his own research, Zeff says that highly sensitive men he interviewed from other countries — such as Thailand and India — were rarely or never teased, while highly sensitive men he interviewed from North America were frequently or always teased. “So a lot of it is very cultural — the same person who is told, ‘Oh, you’re too sensitive,’ in certain cultures, it’s considered an asset,” he says.
4. They prefer to exercise solo.
Highly sensitive people may tend to avoid team sports, where there’s a sense that everyone is watching their every move, Zeff says. In his research, the majority of highly sensitive people he interviewed preferred individual sports, like bicycling, running and hiking, to group sports. However, this is not a blanket rule — there are some highly sensitive people who may have had parents who provided an understanding and supportive environment that would make it easier for them to participate in group sports, Zeff says.
5. It takes longer for them to make decisions.
Highly sensitive people are more aware of subtleties and details that could make decisions harder to make, Aron says. Even if there is no “right” or “wrong” decision — for example, it’s impossible to choose a “wrong” flavor of ice cream — highly sensitive people will still tend to take longer to choose because they are weighing every possible outcome. Aron’s advice for dealing with this: “Take as long to decide as the situation permits, and ask for more time if you need it and can take it,” she writes in a recent issue of her Comfort Zone newsletter. “During this time, try pretending for a minute, hour, day, or even week that you have made up your mind a certain way. How does that feel? Often, on the other side of a decision things look different, and this gives you a chance to imagine more vividly that you are already there.” One exception: Once a highly sensitive person has come to the conclusion of what is the right decision to make and what is the wrong decision to make in a certain situation, he or she will be quick to make that “right” decision again in the future.
6. And on that note, they are more upset if they make a “bad” or “wrong” decision.
You know that uncomfortable feeling you get after you realize you’ve made a bad decision? For highly sensitive people, “that emotion is amplified because the emotional reactivity is higher,” Aron explains.
7. They’re extremely detail-oriented.
Highly sensitive people are the first ones to notice the details in a room, the new shoes that you’re wearing,
or a change in weather.
8. Not all highly sensitive people are introverts.
In fact, about 30 percent of highly sensitive people are extroverts, according to Aron. She explains that many times, highly sensitive people who are also extroverts grew up in a close-knit community — whether it be a cul-de-sac, small town, or with a parent who worked as a minister or rabbi — and thus would interact with a lot of people.
9. They work well in team environments.
Because highly sensitive people are such deep thinkers, they make valuable workers and members of teams, Aron says. However, they may be well-suited for positions in teams where they don’t have to make the final decision. For instance, if a highly sensitive person was part of a medical team, he or she would be valuable in analyzing the pros and cons of a patient having surgery, while someone else would ultimately make the decision about whether that patient would receive the surgery.
10. They’re more prone to anxiety or depression (but only if they’ve had a lot of past negative experiences).
“If you’ve had a fair number of bad experiences, especially early in life, so you don’t feel safe in the world or you don’t feel secure at home or … at school, your nervous system is set to ‘anxious,'” Aron says. But that’s not to say that all highly sensitive people will go on to have anxiety — and in fact, having a supportive environment can go a long way to protecting against this. Parents of highly sensitive children, in particular, need to “realize these are really great kids, but they need to be handled in the right way,” Aron says. “You can’t over-protect them, but you can’t under-protect them, either. You have to titrate that just right when they’re young so they can feel confident and they can do fine.”
11. That annoying sound is probably significantly more annoying to a highly sensitive person.
While it’s hard to say anyone is a fan of annoying noises, highly sensitive people are on a whole more, well, sensitive to chaos and noise. That’s because they tend to be more easily overwhelmed and overstimulated by too much activity, Aron says.
12. Violent movies are the worst.
Because highly sensitive people are so high in empathy and more easily overstimulated, movies with violence or horror themes may not be their cup of tea, Aron says.
13. They cry more easily.
That’s why it’s important for highly sensitive people to put themselves in situations where they won’t be made to feel embarrassed or “wrong” for crying easily, Zeff says. If their friends and family realize that that’s just how they are — that they cry easily — and support that form of expression, then “crying easily” will not be seen as something shameful.
14. They have above-average manners.
Highly sensitive people are also highly conscientious people, Aron says. Because of this, they’re more likely to be considerate and exhibit good manners — and are also more likely to notice when someone else isn’t being conscientious. For instance, highly sensitive people may be more aware of where their cart is at the grocery store — not because they’re afraid someone will steal something out of it, but because they don’t want to be rude and have their cart blocking another person’s way.
15. The effects of criticism are especially amplified in highly sensitive people.
Highly sensitive people have reactions to criticism that are more intense than less sensitive people. As a result, they may employ certain tactics to avoid said criticism, including people-pleasing (so that there is no longer anything to criticize), criticizing themselves first, and avoiding the source of the criticism altogether, according to Aron.
“People can say something negative, [and] a non-HSP [highly sensitive person] can say, ‘Whatever,’ and it doesn’t affect them,” Zeff says. “But a HSP would feel it much more deeply.”
16. Cubicles = good. Open-office plans = bad.
Just like highly sensitive people tend to prefer solo workouts, they may also prefer solo work environments. Zeff says that many highly sensitive people enjoy working from home or being self-employed because they can control the stimuli in their work environments. For those without the luxury of creating their own flexible work schedules (and environments), Zeff notes that highly sensitive people might enjoy working in a cubicle — where they have more privacy and less noise — than in an open-office plan. (Zeff, 2004)
INFP: I am NOT too sensitive!
Now, lets talk about other ways to look at personality types. There are different theories on personality types, so this personality type may not be a fit for you at all. So if you are not an HSP, you may like the personality test below: The very famous Myer Briggs Typology or MBTI.
Carl Jung’s and Isabel Briggs Myers’ typology, along with the strengths of preferences and the description of your personality type, You can take the test here to see your MBTI personality type: http://www.humanmetrics.com/cgi-win/jtypes2.asp
According to Carl G. Jung’s theory of psychological types [Jung, 1971], people can be characterized by their preference of general attitude:
- Extraverted (E) vs. Introverted (I),
their preference of one of the two functions of perception:
- Sensing (S) vs. Intuition (N),
and their preference of one of the two functions of judging:
- Thinking (T) vs. Feeling (F)
The three areas of preferences introduced by Jung are dichotomies (i.e. bipolar dimensions where each pole represents a different preference). Jung also proposed that in a person one of the four functions above is dominant – either a function of perception or a function of judging. Isabel Briggs Myers, a researcher and practitioner of Jung’s theory, proposed to see the judging-perceiving relationship as a fourth dichotomy influencing personality type [Briggs Myers, 1980]:
- Judging (J) vs. Perceiving (P)
The first criterion, Extraversion – Introversion, signifies the source and direction of a person’s energy expression. An extravert’s source and direction of energy expression is mainly in the external world, while an introvert has a source of energy mainly in their own internal world.
The second criterion, Sensing – Intuition, represents the method by which someone perceives information. Sensing means that a person mainly believes information he or she receives directly from the external world. Intuition means that a person believes mainly information he or she receives from the internal or imaginative world.
The third criterion, Thinking – Feeling, represents how a person processes information. Thinking means that a person makes a decision mainly through logic. Feeling means that, as a rule, he or she makes a decision based on emotion, i.e. based on what they feel they should do.
The fourth criterion, Judging – Perceiving, reflects how a person implements the information he or she has processed. Judging means that a person organizes all of his life events and, as a rule, sticks to his plans. Perceiving means that he or she is inclined to improvise and explore alternative options.
All possible permutations of preferences in the 4 dichotomies above yield 16 different combinations, orpersonality types, representing which of the two poles in each of the four dichotomies dominates in a person, thus defining 16 different personality types. Each personality type can be assigned a 4 letter acronym of corresponding combination of preferences:
| ESTJ | ISTJ | ENTJ | INTJ |
| ESTP | ISTP | ENTP | INTP |
| ESFJ | ISFJ | ENFJ | INFJ |
| ESFP | ISFP | ENFP | INFP |
The first letter in the personality type acronym corresponds to the first letter of the preference of general attitude – “E” for extraversion and “I” for introversion.
The second letter in the personality type acronym corresponds to the preference within the sensing-intuition dimension: “S” stands for sensing and “N” stands for intuition.
The third letter in the personality type acronym corresponds to preference within the thinking-feeling pair: “T” stands for thinking and “F” stands for feeling.
The forth letter in the personality type acronym corresponds a person’s preference within the judging-perceiving pair: “J” for judging and “P” for perception.
For example:
- ISTJ stands for Introverted, Sensing, Thinking, Judging
- ENFP stands for Extraverted, Intuitive, Feeling, Perceiving
Take the two tests and then explore what you feel is a more correct way of defining how you see yourself living in the world. Let me know what you think? Later we will discuss HSP and Sensory Integration Disorder.
Angela Zaffer, MA, NCC, LPCC
Aron, Elaine N.Ph.D. 2016. http://hsperson.com/
Aron,Elaine N. Ph.D. June 2 1997. The Highly Sensitive Person. Paperback, Amazon
Zeff,Tedd. Ph.D. 2004. The Highly Sensitive Person’s Survival Guide : Essential Skills for Living Well in an Overstimulating World.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/02/26/highly-sensitive-people-signs-habits_n_4810794.html
Angela Zaffer 